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From: Eliza T. Dresang <edresang>
Date: Thu, 29 Oct 1998 21:55:20 -0500
Hi Ruth and others,
I'll take a stab at responding to your question, but from a "personal use" point of view.
"Linear" means to me a step by step forward progression from a beginning to an end. In children's literature this is the "normal" way to tell or read a story. As Kate McClelland said in her post earlier this week, when her young critics talk about linear "they describe a one hill roller coaster with their words and hands." Linearity can be either in time or georgraphy or other? Nonlinear refers to plots that "run off the track" or encourage the reader to run off the track of the one hill progression. The plot itself may be overall linear (and usually is as I mentioned earlier this month), but the progression may be anything but. Either the way the author/illustrator presents the text may be nonlinear in a fixed sort of way (as in Whirligig or Holes) or it may present various options of nonlinear reading experience to the reader by how it is structured (as in Black and White, the Magic School Bus). Related terms are "sequential, " i.e., "what comes next is clearly and directly related to what comes before" and "interactive," which means that something about the plot requires a special measure of intellectual "interactivity" from the reader. In other words, a plot where there are "holes."
Flashbacks are not a "new device" of course, but they -- along with other nonlinear or nonsequential or interactive forms and formats--are appearing far more frequently in literature for young people than ever in the past. Many authors in the past did not think that children could "handle" anything but the one hill roller coaster with a predictable sequence. Everything needed to move from front to back, left to right.
But it probably doesn't really matter which term we use -- the interesting thing is that books for children are using many more varied and challenging plot sequences and that many of them fit with the types of challenges they run into with digital media.
Recently on amazon.com there was an interview with Jon Sciezcka (Stinky Cheese Man) who says his work is influenced by Don Quixote. I think you hit the nail on the head, Big Grandma. (The interview seems to now have gone off into cyberspace. I just checked and don't see it).
To end, I'd suggest that the picture book under discussion, Ormerod's Who's Whose?, is nonlinear because one can "read" the pictures and words in a lot of different ways and make sense, movng back and forth on any given page in many different "orders." (but the overall plot is linear moving through the days of the week). There are really no big "jolts" in terms of what follows what -- it is pretty sequential, everything is pretty clearly related to what comes before. It is definitely interactive, requiring that the young reader pause and ponder what is reallly going on.
Eliza
At 08:55 PM 10/28/98 00, you wrote:
*********************************************************************** Eliza T. Dresang, Associate Professor
School of Information Studies Florida State University Tallahassee, Florida 32306!00 e-mail: edresang at mailer.fsu.edu Phone: 850 644 5877 (w) Phone: 850 224 1637 (h) FAX: 850 644 6253 (w) FAX: 850 224 1637 (h)
Received on Thu 29 Oct 1998 08:55:20 PM CST
Date: Thu, 29 Oct 1998 21:55:20 -0500
Hi Ruth and others,
I'll take a stab at responding to your question, but from a "personal use" point of view.
"Linear" means to me a step by step forward progression from a beginning to an end. In children's literature this is the "normal" way to tell or read a story. As Kate McClelland said in her post earlier this week, when her young critics talk about linear "they describe a one hill roller coaster with their words and hands." Linearity can be either in time or georgraphy or other? Nonlinear refers to plots that "run off the track" or encourage the reader to run off the track of the one hill progression. The plot itself may be overall linear (and usually is as I mentioned earlier this month), but the progression may be anything but. Either the way the author/illustrator presents the text may be nonlinear in a fixed sort of way (as in Whirligig or Holes) or it may present various options of nonlinear reading experience to the reader by how it is structured (as in Black and White, the Magic School Bus). Related terms are "sequential, " i.e., "what comes next is clearly and directly related to what comes before" and "interactive," which means that something about the plot requires a special measure of intellectual "interactivity" from the reader. In other words, a plot where there are "holes."
Flashbacks are not a "new device" of course, but they -- along with other nonlinear or nonsequential or interactive forms and formats--are appearing far more frequently in literature for young people than ever in the past. Many authors in the past did not think that children could "handle" anything but the one hill roller coaster with a predictable sequence. Everything needed to move from front to back, left to right.
But it probably doesn't really matter which term we use -- the interesting thing is that books for children are using many more varied and challenging plot sequences and that many of them fit with the types of challenges they run into with digital media.
Recently on amazon.com there was an interview with Jon Sciezcka (Stinky Cheese Man) who says his work is influenced by Don Quixote. I think you hit the nail on the head, Big Grandma. (The interview seems to now have gone off into cyberspace. I just checked and don't see it).
To end, I'd suggest that the picture book under discussion, Ormerod's Who's Whose?, is nonlinear because one can "read" the pictures and words in a lot of different ways and make sense, movng back and forth on any given page in many different "orders." (but the overall plot is linear moving through the days of the week). There are really no big "jolts" in terms of what follows what -- it is pretty sequential, everything is pretty clearly related to what comes before. It is definitely interactive, requiring that the young reader pause and ponder what is reallly going on.
Eliza
At 08:55 PM 10/28/98 00, you wrote:
*********************************************************************** Eliza T. Dresang, Associate Professor
School of Information Studies Florida State University Tallahassee, Florida 32306!00 e-mail: edresang at mailer.fsu.edu Phone: 850 644 5877 (w) Phone: 850 224 1637 (h) FAX: 850 644 6253 (w) FAX: 850 224 1637 (h)
Received on Thu 29 Oct 1998 08:55:20 PM CST
